


Across the Polish Plain

by Annariel



Category: Primeval
Genre: Historical, M/M, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-29
Updated: 2012-12-29
Packaged: 2017-11-22 20:52:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 12,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/614210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annariel/pseuds/Annariel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Becker, Lester and Emily find themselves trapped in 13th Century Poland.  Naturally, they embark upon a road trip to Novgorod.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Field Near Hereford

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lukadreaming](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Lukadreaming).



> Written for as part of the secret santa. The prompts were "All the birds they are singing for you...", "I've walked the hill a hundred times to hear the river talking", "And the bells were ringing out for Christmas day", "The road goes on for ever across the Polish plain." I've managed to incorporate them all though most are a bit blink and you'll miss it. I also feel the need to point out that the Polish Plain is just a small part of the Great European Plain which stretches from the Pyrenees to the Urals. Hence, I maintain, that Novgorod is still, technically, on a road across the Polish Plain.
> 
> Thanks to FredBassett for beta-reading

Becker stared glumly at the anomaly. It was twinkling in the middle of a muddy field in the pouring rain. It looked upbeat and sparkly. He suspected it was doing it deliberately.

"At least we didn't have to come far," Connor said in a tone of forced jollity.

Becker grunted as his boots sank into the mud and he blinked the rain out of his eyes.

"I'll go first, there may be tracks," Matt said.

"Be my guest." Becker was frankly in no hurry to go any deeper into the mud bath masquerading as a field in front of him. He waited while Connor unloaded the anomaly locking device. Matt and Emily walked towards the anomaly; their figures rapidly began to look dim and bedraggled.

"Ready?" asked Connor.

Becker nodded with resignation and led the way out across the mud. There were flakes of snow drifting through the anomaly. Just perfect really.

Matt and Emily had circled around to the far side. 

"Any tracks?" he called.

"Don't seem to be," Matt shouted back.

At that moment a man ran out of the anomaly. He was wearing a knee-length mud-brown tunic, over which was a fur-lined cloak and a furry hat. Becker grabbed him as he ran past, hauling him to a halt.

The man gabbled at him in a language Becker couldn't understand.

"Great, now we've got medieval peasants on our hands," he grumbled.

"Watch out!" Abby's shout made him look up quickly. A raptor was bounding out of the anomaly, heading straight for him. Instinctively he threw himself on the ground on top of the peasant, anticipating incoming fire.

There was more shouting. Becker raised his head to see more men running through the anomaly.

He heard the buzz of an EMD and detected the characteristic smell of ozone on the air. Becker looked towards the sound. Abby was approaching the fallen raptor, her EMD kept closely pointed at it. The peasants were staring at her open-mouthed.

"Err... should I lock the anomaly?" Connor asked.

"For the moment," Becker decided struggling to his feet. He was ever so slightly smug to note that falling on top of the peasant meant he wasn't nearly as covered in mud as he could have been. The peasant, on the other hand, didn't look so pristine.

The medieval men murmured again as Connor activated the locking device. 

Abby nipped over and pecked Connor on the cheek. "Well done!"

Becker looked back at the peasants. He could tell they were already gossiping about the Temples. Any minute now they would start demanding details of the full soap opera, probably to be delivered via interpretive mime.

"Anybody speak medieval?" he asked.

* * *

"What's the situation?" Lester asked, trying vainly to make sense of the images Jess had up on the screens.

"We've got a group of humans who have come through the anomaly. They seem to be medieval."

"Seem?"

"Judging by their clothes. No one's been able to speak to them. Emily has tried both Latin and Middle-English, or at least she says she quoted Chaucer. She thinks they recognised the Latin but she couldn't make out what they said back."

Lester found himself interested in spite of himself. "Can you get them on speakers?" he asked.

Jess pressed a few buttons in an efficient fashion and a low voice speaking in a language full of consonants echoed through the operations centre.

"That sounds like German. Do you mean to tell me that no one on the anomaly team speaks German?"

Jess glanced up at him. "Do you want me to check their files?"

"No, no, patch me through."

"I don't think that will do much good sir. They won't know what a radio is."

Lester sighed. "Very well, get me a car. It's not like I had anything better to do today."

"There are those audit forms to counter-sign."

"Like I said, nothing better to do."

"No disrespect, sir, but how good is your medieval German?"

"I did a whole lecture course on it at university which I suspect makes it considerably better than that of anyone else you'll be able to contact at short notice."

* * *

Becker felt distinctly uncomfortable having Lester out in the field with them, albeit in an extremely natty long woolen coat and a classic black umbrella. He was standing in the rain, holding the umbrella straight up above his head and talking to the peasants.

"Well, sir?" he asked as the conversation reached a lull.

"They seem to be merchants. I can't quite place the period, I did German literature at university but I'm afraid these days I'm apt to confuse my Old High with my Mid High German. And anyway these men are talking dialect."

"Very good, sir."

"You haven't a clue what I'm talking about, have you, Captain?"

Becker felt a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. "No sir."

Lester sighed. "They're from somewhere called Culm which Jess tells me is in modern-day Poland. The man you so thoughtfully coated in mud is their leader, Ładislas."

"So, we just send them back."

"That could be troublesome. Apparently there are more monsters on the far side of the anomaly."

"We could send a group through. There must be a second anomaly in their time." Matt suggested.

"No one goes through the anomaly," said Becker.

"We can't let them stay here," Matt said.

Becker bit back the retort that the anomaly team seemed to be awash with temporally displaced persons these days because, frankly, Matt and Emily were one thing where a dozen medieval Polish merchants was quite another.

"We can't send them back without some protection," Emily chipped in.

At that moment Ładislas stepped forward, trying to claim Lester's attention. Becker watched them talk slowly and carefully to each other while waving their hands around. He was surprised when Lester waved Connor over.

Connor shook the merchant's hands in a rather bemused fashion. 

"They want to thank you for locking the anomaly, and your wife for killing the raptor."

"Don't I get thanked in person!" Abby pouted.

"Apparently not." Lester frowned at her in a way that clearly said `shut up and don't make a fuss'.

"What about me, I saved him by landing on top of him and getting him covered in mud," Becker added.

Lester didn't even dignify that with a response, but turned back to the merchants. There was more chatter and a great deal of gesticulating.

"Well?" asked Becker impatiently.

"They're prepared to go back through the anomaly if some guards go with them. I'll need to come too, to act as liaison."

"Absolutely not."

"I believe I'm in charge here." Lester's face was at its most bland which meant he was at his most determined.

"With all due respect, sir, you do not have authority in the field."

"Mr Anderson does." Lester turned to Matt with one eyebrow raised.

Matt visibly wavered. "It'll have to be quick."

Becker growled with anger. "Myself and Matt as guards then."

"One of us will need to co-ordinate at this end," said Matt.

"I'll go!" said Emily.

"You and me then," said Becker firmly. If Lester was really mad enough to go through an anomaly then he was damned if he was going to let the man out of his sight. "But I'd like to register my considerable opposition to the plan."

"You have a better alternative?" Lester said with an exaggerated sigh.

"Shoot them with the EMDs and then toss them back through."

"Tempting as that may be, let's at least try to do this without resorting to violence."

Becker hadn't really expected the suggestion to be taken seriously. "If you say so, sir!"

"Don't go all formal on me Becker, it reeks of sarcasm and insubordination! Well, no time like the present."

Becker sighed. "At least take an EMD yourself, sir."

"Oh very well!" 

Abby passed Lester her EMD pistol. Her face was pinched with worry. "Be careful."

Lester's face softened slightly. "Don't worry, I'll let Captain Becker and Lady Merchant stand in the front and do all the fighting."

Becker sighed. Might as well get it over with. "Right! Emily and I will go first. Then the civilians and Lester!"

Becker braced himself with his gun trained on the anomaly. Emily stood at his side. Becker caught Connor's eyes and nodded. The anomaly burst open. Becker paused to see if anything was going to rush out and attack them and then he stepped smartly through the portal.

It was much colder on the far side and light snow was swirling through dense woodland. Becker swung around rapidly covering the area. There was unmistakable movement from among the trees. He moved forward, Emily at his side. Two raptors burst from cover and charged at them.

Becker fired twice. There was a murmur of voices behind them. Becker contained his annoyance that the civilians hadn't waited for an all clear. Shouting at this point would only slow things down.

"Their caravan is this way," Lester announced. 

Becker could see him shepherding the procession of men in a polite fashion, his umbrella still held high. Becker checked the anomaly detector in his pocket. He was relieved to see it only registered one signal in the area. 

While Emily led the merchants towards their caravan, sweeping the trees with her gun. Becker took the opportunity to nip back through the anomaly and report on the situation.

"We'll bring the raptors through to this side. Put them in the menagerie until we can repatriate them," decided Matt.

Becker nodded his agreement and then hurried back through, anxious to keep the group of merchants and, more importantly, Lester in sight.

They weren't far from the road. In fact they were obviously on some kind of side track because the undergrowth in the forest was so thick that the merchants would have quickly been raptor meat if they'd tried to push their way through it. The road itself looked more like a wide mud track than a highway. Becker was already anxious to get back as Lester talked to the merchants.

"What's the hold up?" he demanded.

"They've lost their guard," Lester reported.

"Not our problem. We need to get back before the anomaly closes."

"I agree with Becker. This is taking too long," said Emily.

She still had her EMD trained on the surrounding forest and Becker shared her concern. His instincts warned him there were still creatures out there. Their alertness must have shown because Lester frowned at him.

"You think there are still raptors in the woods."

"There can't be too many, sir. Their anomaly has closed."

"These men are ill-equipped to deal with dinosaurs."

That was the rub really. All of Becker's military instincts were screaming at him that this was not their problem and they needed to get out of here fast. But he knew that Lester was deeply compassionate under his hard exterior of disdain. It would be difficult to persuade him to abandon the merchants without protection. 

Which, of course, was why they were in this ridiculous situation in the first place. At some point Becker was probably going to have to knock Lester over the head and then carry him back to the anomaly.

"We will do a quick sweep," said Emily in clipped tones.

"We don't have time for this," Becker whispered at her as they moved cautiously into the trees.

"Anything else will take even more time," Emily retorted.

"Damned inconvenient moment for him to grow a heart."

Emily shot Becker a look, but didn't comment.

The undergrowth was thick and impeded movement. They started back up the path to the anomaly, looking for routes deeper into the forest. Once away from the chatter of the caravan, Becker quickly heard sounds of movement in the trees. Forcing his way between the bushes Becker began to move towards the sound. Emily fell in behind him. They made their way in single file a short distance, the sounds getting louder the whole time. Then Becker saw a clearing ahead where a raptor was feeding off a body, presumably one of the caravan's guards. He lined up his sights carefully and shot the creature.

"We need to kill it." Emily marched out into the clearing, pulling a knife from a sheath on her leg.

"What? Why?" Not that he was necessarily objecting, but it was a surprise.

"We can't afford to carry it back to our anomaly and we can't leave it here to wake up. I will not tell Abby, if you don't."

While Emily efficiently cut the creature's throat, reminding Becker once again, that she was far from the delicate lady she sometimes appeared, he pulled the anomaly detector from his pocket.

"I think the signal is getting fainter."

Emily stood up and wiped her knife on the forest floor.

"Hopefully James will be more reasonable now."

"Keep that knife drawn, just in case. It may impress him."

* * *

"Lester, we have to move now!" Becker shouted as soon as they came in sight of the road once more.

"We have killed another raptor but the anomaly is getting weaker," Emily added.

Lester nodded and said something briefly to the men around him. Then he began walking towards them. Becker grabbed him by the arm and began to hurry them through the woods. Emily led the way, anomaly detector in one hand and her EMD in the other.

"When we get back I'm revising policy to make it clear that we never go through anomalies, ever!" Becker muttered angrily.

"That's my decision, Becker."

"It was a fucking bad one, with all due respect, sir."

He could see the anomaly between the trees. The light was pulsing. Becker picked up his pace.

There was a sudden flare and then the three of them were plunged into the deep gloom of the Polish forest.

"A really fucking bad decision," Becker repeated with some force.


	2. Culm

Becker followed Emily down Culm's long straight main street. The strange mixture of Lord of the Rings meets Milton Keynes never failed to amuse him. The concept of the "new town" laid out in a rigid grid had changed little in a thousand years it seemed. Milton Keynes did have a sewer system though. Becker wrinkled his nose at the foul smelling drain that ran down the centre of the street. At least with the ground frozen he didn't have to worry too much about what actually made up the compacted road surface on either side of it.

Emily was doing their daily shop buying bread, fish and ale. They already had bags full of millet, dried peas and pots of pickled sauerkraut back at their lodgings and Becker had little hope of seeing fresh vegetables until spring. He'd honestly never thought he would miss the sight of greens.

They were lucky that Culm was such a melting pot. It had only been established a few years earlier and many of the inhabitants were incomers to the area. Hardly anyone seemed to speak the same language. Emily's smattering of Latin and a great deal of sign language got them through the haggling. Becker was grateful for her presence. He had never had to go from shop to shop to bargain for each item. Emily had been doing it all her life.

He watched as the fishmonger wrapped two fish in cloth and handed the bundle to Emily, who gave it to him to put in the large bag he was carrying. 

"Is that everything?" he asked.

"Almost. I want to order us some bags of pulmentum avenaticum. If I've understood properly, it's a sort of millet flour that can be cooked up on long journeys."

Becker made a face but nodded his agreement. The merchants they had rescued from the raptors had paid them surprisingly generously. The money would have kept the three of them comfortably in Culm for a long time, but they had agreed they needed to risk it on an attempt to reach the 21st century once more. The bulk of the small fortune had therefore gone on armour, weapons and horses. They were almost ready to leave now. It was just a matter of planning the actual journey.

Becker fell in behind Emily once more as they continued on their way. Emily was dressed as a German merchant's wife in a well-made, if somewhat shapeless, red dress of thick wool, a linen head covering that Becker kept mentally calling a wimple, and a fur-lined cloak. Becker was wearing the clothes of a servant, a knee-length tunic in a dull brown and a sheepskin coat. He had taken to acting dumb if anyone spoke to him. 

They found a miller with a variety of different grains in sacks. It appeared his Latin was at least as good as Emily's and so there was a lot of discussion which seemed to end in an agreement and Emily handed over her money. This was followed by yet more chatter. Becker recognised gossip when he saw it, even if he couldn't understand the actual words.

"Well?" he asked as they left the shop.

"The crusaders will be setting out on another push soon. Heading north up the Vistula."

"Are you thinking we should go with them?" Becker asked.

Emily cocked her head to one side. "Maybe, it's certainly an option."

Their plan, such as it was, was to head for Novgorod. Emily recalled a conversation with Ethan in which he had claimed there was a recurring anomaly there to the early 21st century which opened annually around Christmas time. Becker hated relying on anything Ethan had told them, but it was their best lead. The anomaly detector itself had been silent for six weeks, ever since they had arrived in the 13th century. Luckily for them, it could run on solar energy and they were careful to keep it charged but that didn't do them a lot of good if there were no anomalies.

Becker and Emily turned right onto one of the cross streets and almost instantly had to dodge out the way of a cavalcade of crusaders. A dozen men rode past them, all in the distinctive white robes and black cross of the Teutonic Knights. Becker looked around him at the faces in the crowd. He was painfully aware that the town had been planted here a mere decade earlier in order to assert Christian control on the area. It wasn't quite like walking through Kabul or Baghdad, partly because the knights had swamped the place with Germans from the crowded principalities to the south. The German burghers of Culm were supportive of the crusade that had placed them in such an advantageous position. The native Polish were harder to fathom. All had converted to Christianity as demanded by the crusaders but many seemed content to go to Church for mass and then slip away to the old oak groves at other times, and to an extent the knights appeared content to let them do so. No one spat at the knights as they passed, nor called names, retribution would have been swift if they had. Becker searched the crowd trying to distinguish German from Pole, supporter from potential threat, but the expressions remained impossible for him to fathom. No one was worrying about the human rights of the Polish and, as a result, they were more than careful in concealing their true thoughts.

Once the knights had passed, Becker and Emily crossed the street and entered their lodging house. Lester was sitting by the fireplace, wrapped in a blanket, obviously already back from his own morning errands.

He glanced up as they came in. "This place is bloody cold all the time."

"It'll get colder before it gets warmer," Becker observed.

"You are such a comfort to me, Becker."

"I've ordered provisions for the journey," said Emily brightly, cutting through the habitual sniping the two men had fallen into ever since getting trapped in the 13th century.

Lester perked up visibly and came to join them at the table where they had a rough sketch map of their route, drawn up as best they could from local gossip and their own memories of northern Europe and Scandinavia.

The Teutonic knights held two big blocks of territory, one in the north of 21st century Poland, but lands that would be Prussian before they became Polish, and one in modern day Latvia. Between them was the last stronghold of the ancient European brand of paganism. If Sarah had been with them she would have been fascinated. Becker winced at the thought.

"The miller said the crusaders will be moving north soon," reported Emily. "If we sail up the Vistula with them, we can cross to Riga by sea. Then we can either get a ship into the gulf of Finland or take the river and land route from there to Novgorod. It's supposed to be a well-used merchant route so it shouldn't be difficult to find and follow." Emily's finger moved along the river that ran north through Culm and then across the Baltic Sea."

"Ładislas is planning a trip the other way, down to Thorn and then up and east into Pomesania along the Drwȩca," Lester said, referring to the leader of the merchant caravan they had encountered weeks ago in that field near Hereford.

"He really is a wily old pagan," Becker said with approval. He'd had his suspicions about Ładislas, but this confirmed it. The only reason to take a trade caravan west into the pagan lands was if you had friends, relatives and contacts there to trade with.

"He knows us and feels he owes us a debt of gratitude. We can travel a fair distance with him, and I suspect he'll send word ahead that we are to be welcomed. He seems to have relatives right up into Lithuania."

"On the other hand, we know that territory is a whole patchwork of rival groups and tribes. Ładislas can only help us so far," Becker argued.

"Lithuania is pretty united these days under Mindaugas. I think Ładislas' network gives us a good chance and I'm frankly a little concerned about travelling with the crusaders. Their zealotry may not work well with our modern attitudes."

Becker rolled his eyes. "I think we all understand we need to keep our heads down."

Lester glared at him. "I'm not expecting anyone here to give an ill-advised and impassioned speech on multi-culturalism or feminism. I _am_ concerned that we will seem odd in lots of small ways and that may not work well with a bunch of crusaders riding off against the pagan."

"We can also earn more pay with Ładislas' caravan," said Emily thoughtfully.

"Yes, but presumably he will leave us at or near the source of the Drwȩca with at least a month's journey, on foot, through unmapped territory before we can hope to meet up with the major trade routes in Livonia," Becker pointed out. "If we go with the knights, we'll be on known roads and rivers the whole way."

"I'm hoping you are under-estimating the extent to which the pagan lands are trackless and trade-free wastes," said Lester.

Becker glanced at Emily, but he could tell she was siding with Lester. Her finger was ghosting along the waving line of the Drwȩca.

"Fine! I can see I'm out-voted," he said gracelessly.

There was a small strained silence and then Lester crossed to the window and fished about in a small bag.

"I got you something" he said. He placed handed Becker a small earthenware pot sealed with a cork.

"What is it?" asked Becker.

"You were complaining about the lack of hair care products. I gather this is the best the locals have."

Becker unstoppered the pot and sniffed dubiously at the contents which had a smoky fragrant smell. "What is it?"

"A mixture of flax oil and rosemary, I believe."

"Good grief! And you expect me to put that on my hair."

"The alternative was lizard tallow and swallow droppings."

Becker scowled at Lester. "Now you're making fun of me."

Lester sighed. "No, seriously. I know it's not much but it's really the best I think you are going to get around here. It doesn't look that bad."

Becker glared at him.

"Well, I think it was a very thoughtful gesture," said Emily firmly.

Becker glared at her as well.


	3. Western Pomesania

They journeyed down to the town of Thorn where the Drwȩca met the Vistula, and then out east up the smaller river. The trip was as event free as you could reasonably expect of a journey in the depths of winter on a long drawn out frontier. They travelled by boat down the central channel of the rivers for as long as they remained navigable and then switched to horses. The hard frozen ground was at least relatively easy to travel over. Once the spring thaw began, the ground would become muddy, marshy and much harder to cross. Once Ładislas was certain the ice was thick enough, they rode up the river itself

All three of them were ostensibly employed as guards, though it was quickly clear that the merchants only really expected Becker to act in this capacity. However, while in Culm, they had also managed to find a mail hauberk and a helmet that fitted Emily. Ładislas raised his eyebrows when she first donned such martial clothing, once they were a safe distance from Culm, but he clearly didn't object to a second guard. 

Becker had vainly attempted to get hold of some kind of plate mail but without any luck. The chain mail hauberks were heavy and a bugger to get on and off, not unlike trying to put on an extremely heavy and unwieldy jumper. The mail coats hung down to their knees and were slit up the front to allow them to sit astride a horse. They wore woolen tabards in a neutral brown colour over the top. Becker also had chain mail chausses for his legs but he was doubtful about wearing them. The leather soles sewn into the feet were completely smooth and he felt he'd rather trust the grip of his army boots in a fight.

They had managed to get metal helmets of the flat top style favoured by the crusaders. They restricted vision, but Becker felt safer in them than a small metal helmet with just a nose guard. The chain-mail coif underneath made a mess of his hair but his hair was a lost cause anyway until he managed to get back to the 21st century. He had Lester's unused pot of noxious lotion in his saddle-bags for reasons he couldn't quite fathom. It was clearly ridiculous stuff, but he couldn't quite bring himself to throw it away.

Lester had agreed to wear a coat of thick padded leather underneath his merchant clothes. However, he had taken one look at Emily staggering around under the weight of her hauberk and announced he wasn't wearing any metal.

"It'll just slow me down when I try to run away," he pointed out.

"You don't run away. It's one of your more annoying characteristics," Becker had pointed out.

"You've never seen me under attack from a horde of medieval brigands."

Emily had persevered with the heavy chain. Within a week she was moving more easily under the weight and by the time they left Thorn she wore it as easily as Becker wore his. The pot helm concealed her face and hair. When riding along in full armour she was indistinguishable from a man.

They were a couple of weeks out of Thorn and deep into what Becker mentally classed as disputed territory when the sound of the anomaly detector going off startled them all. The merchants let out shouts of fear. It took Becker a moment or two to realise what he was hearing and then he had the machine out of his saddle bag.

"Which direction?" demanded Emily.

"North!" Becker pointed.

Lester shouted something at the merchants in German while Becker slid of his horse, pulled their EMDs out of another saddle bag and then charged, slowly and heavily, off into the forest, weaving his way through the trees and pushing through the undergrowth. One advantage of the chain was that he barely noticed the small twigs and thorns that pulled at his clothing. His feet sank into the snow and he was more grateful than ever that he'd stuck with his army boots.

"Becker! You have no idea where the anomaly will lead!" Lester shouted somewhere behind him.

"I won't know until I check," he muttered under his breath.

He'd not gone far when the sounds of roaring creatures met his ears. He stopped up short, listening more carefully.

"They sound angry," Emily said from beside him.

"Whatever they are."

"They also do not sound 21st century."

"It might be another double anomaly. We won't know until we look."

Emily's head turned towards him, but he couldn't see her expression through the narrow eye slit in her helmet. However she followed him as they moved towards the sounds and the signal on the detector.

There were signs of human activity in the forest. Becker realised they were following a rough track. That meant there was a settlement of some kind up ahead. Then, almost before they knew it, they came to the edge of the trees and there in front of them was one of the square wooden forts, favoured by pagan and Christian alike.

This was pretty clearly a crusader fort, however. Becker could see the knights' distinctive tabards up in the three story gatehouse. It consisted of an inner courtyard surrounded by a wooden palisade, with a tall square central tower in the middle. There was a big ditch around this and then a further palisade. The gatehouse was placed in front of a narrow wooden bridge across the ditch.

"Well, I'll confess I never expected to see a sight like this." Lester had reached them, only huffing slightly. 

Becker noticed he was also carrying his EMD.

Becker looked back at the fort. The most prominent thing about it, the thing Becker was largely in a state of indecision about, was the three triceratops. They were massive, reaching almost to the spiked tops of the outer palisade. The knights in the gatehouse were firing crossbows down at the creatures, to little apparent effect, unless you counted enraging them further. Like great siege engines, the dinosaurs were charging the wooden stakes. Already the structure was buckling and it seemed unlikely it would last long. Becker glanced at the detector in his hand. The anomaly was to the west of the fort. They could circle it and leave the knights and the dinosaurs to fight it out.

"They _are_ only herbivores, or so I'm told," said Lester.

Becker shot him a look of disbelief. "Do you actually read any of the reports we send to you? Herbivores are fucking dangerous."

Lester raised his eyebrows but said nothing. He glanced pointedly back at the fort.

Becker sighed. "Oh very well, we'll rescue the bloody religious zealots from the harmless grass-eaters."

"Did they have grass in the Cretaceous?" Lester asked.

"How am I supposed to bloody know? Do I look like Connor?"

"Let's get on with it then," Emily snapped and strode out into the cleared area in front of the fort. She got within about 100 yards of the animals and then dropped to one knee taking careful aim with her EMD. 

"Keep yours in reserve, we may need it and we can't recharge them," Becker ordered Lester and then he too ran out into the clearing.

It took Emily three shots to down the first Triceratops. The crackle of the electricity caught the attention of the second and it swung around to face the two of them.

Becker adjusted his EMD to full power and stopped some space away from Emily and fired. The Triceratops swung its head sluggishly in his direction and then began lumbering towards him. Becker fired again and was pleased to see it go down.

Emily moved forwards to get closer to the last. It was already heading towards her. Becker heard the unmistakable fizz of an EMD discharging on low power. A fallen triceratops blocked his path and he would have to run around it to reach Emily's position. In the mean time the vast herbivore was bearing rapidly down upon her at high speed. Emily shot one final time, letting off a small spark of energy that did little more than twinkle prettily and then lumbered away at right angles to the beast, forcing it into a cumbersome turn in order to follow her.

"Oi!" Becker shouted, attempting to attract its attention.

He fired his EMD. He wasn't quite close enough for the full blast to hit the creature but it was closing the distance on Emily and he wanted to buy her time. The triceratops skidded to a halt, clearly confused. Becker fired again, closer this time. It took a couple of steps towards him. He fired a final time and it went down.

When he looked down at his gun the red warning light on the battery was flashing.

* * *

That night there was feasting. Ładislas and his merchants were invited and hunched quietly at the far end of the hall, clearly anxious that someone would question their presence so deep into pagan lands. Becker and Emily were the guests of honour and they sat with Lester on the high table.

Emily was sitting, straight-backed and proud next to Herman Gartner the leader of the small detachment of Teutonic knights. There had been something of a sensation when she had first removed her helmet and pushed back her coif so that her brown curls sprang out around her face. Becker had been half-convinced they were done for. Not only did they have a woman fighting with them, but she was allowing her hair to flow around unbound. Becker wasn't quite sure how Emily had done it, though it had clearly involved a lot of declaiming in Latin, but she seemed to have convinced the knights that she was some kind of Joan of Arc and they were now all in awe of the soldier maid. She'd also explained away the EMDs in the process as a blessing from God. This unexpectedly gave them the status of proto-saints as opposed to dangerous heathens. Becker was surprised but didn't intend to knock it.

Food was brought first to Gartner at the head of the table, then it got passed down to Emily, then Becker and then Lester. Becker didn't quite follow the pecking order after that, but he was already feeling full before the first dishes made their way to the merchants at the bottom of the makeshift hall. An effort was clearly being made with the food, but it was hard to disguise the fact that this was a frontier fort, not some grand lord's hall. The trenchers had been freshly baked which wasn't always the case this far from the towns. There was some fresh gamey meat, a pottage made from the ubiquitous dried peas and millet with a few lumps of bacon floating in it, and a _compositum_ (which looked to Becker much like a stew) which appeared to consist of cabbage and mushrooms with cheese dumplings. It was all served with a honey-flavoured beer that Becker viewed initially with suspicion, having fallen foul of "thick beer" a couple of times in Culm. However this didn't appear to have quite the deceptive kick of thick beer. It wasn't the kind of thing he'd have ever drunk in the 20th century but it was pleasant enough now he was used to the taste of things in medieval Poland.

"They've built the coral around the triceratops. They're remarkably efficient when they put their minds to things," said Lester, breaking into Becker's contemplation of the food.

Becker winced. "Do you really think it's safe to let them keep them?"

"I'm not sure we have a great deal of choice. I'd hate to get on the wrong side of these crusaders. You said yourself that their campaigns were both brutal and bloody."

"By modern standards."

Lester gave him a look. "We'll be equally dead either way."

Becker sighed. "Well given the things are herbivores, I imagine they'll be OK if they're not spooked and kept fed."

"Since none of us know how to sex a triceratops we'll just have to hope they don't have a breeding couple."

Becker laughed. He glanced again at Lester and saw a small smile tugging at the corners of the man's mouth.

"Am I forgiven?" Lester asked.

"For what?"

"Getting us trapped here?"

They could have ignored the knights' plight and headed for the anomaly. The knights would probably even have survived. In fact, having had a closer look at the fortress Becker was fairly certain that the Triceratops would have become stuck in the ditch. They'd have destroyed the bridge, of course, but the knights would probably have figured a way out eventually. At any rate, there had been no need to rush to bring the dinosaurs down. Then again the anomaly would almost certainly have taken them no further than the Cretaceous. Becker sighed and felt something uncoil inside him. He realised that he had been quietly raging against Lester ever since they had arrived.

"Yes, you are forgiven."

Lester made a sketchy motion with his hand, which might have been a salute. "If it's any consolation, I intend to write a memo as soon as I get back directing that I should not be allowed to accompany medieval Germans through anomalies."

And Becker found himself laughing again. Maybe he'd try out that hair gel in the morning, just to amuse Lester in turn.


	4. Pomesania

Ładislas and his merchants eventually turned back as the Drwȩca became narrower. Becker, Lester and Emily then set off over-land on their own. The landscape was a mixture of dense forest and marshland. The frozen ground made the marsh relatively easy to cross, though the snow impeded progress but, in the forests, Becker had to hack them a path and they went single file, leading the horses. It gave Lester plenty of opportunity to admire Becker from behind, but it limited the opportunities for conversation.

Lester was worrying quietly about Becker. Both he and Emily could make conversation in a limited fashion with the people they met, or at least those with a smattering of either German or Latin, but Becker was entirely at sea with only the two of them to talk to.

"Becker will be fine," Emily said with an air of finality the one time Lester had raised the subject with her.

"He's been pretty foul-tempered ever since we got here."

"He was sulking. He seems happier now. Especially when you actually talk to him instead of hanging back here and fretting about him to me."

Lester squinted at Emily in the murky light of the forest and tried to work out if that was an entirely innocent remark, or whether the cunning minx was trying to set him up.

Becker had had a compass in his tac vest when they first arrived in the 13th century and they used that to make sure they kept moving in a generally northerly direction while following existing pathways through the forest as much as possible. The nights were bitterly cold even in a dug out snow hole, with a tent and camp fire, and they slept huddled together. Though he attempted to keep his feelings to himself, Lester still felt a small thrill of pleasure to wake up each morning, next to Becker's sleeping form.

At noon one day they came to a wide river in a deep cutting. The sides were steep and they weren't confident that they could get the horses down safely. They turned north east, following the river to its source and waiting for sign of a crossing. When they came, towards dusk, upon a narrow wooden bridge they were surprised to find an elderly man, leaning against the rail and gazing at the frozen waters below.

"Sijt gegrôtet," Lester hazarded as a greeting.

"Got grüeze iuch," the man responded in perfect High German.

Lester's surprise must have shown for the man laughed gently. "Some of us are well-travelled and educated, for all the church likes to present us as barbarians."

"My apologies." Lester gave a small bow.

The man looked over the three of them. "You will be the companions of Konnor who came with Ładislas up the Drwȩca."

Lester's surprised doubled. "Indeed. You seem remarkably well-informed about us."

"Word travels fast in these parts and the tales of your exploits and Konnor the god himself are strange and much told."

"Is he talking about Connor?" Becker asked suspiciously, clearly having picked up on the word amidst the man's German.

"I am very much afraid so," Lester agreed.

"I am Baron. I live not too far from here but often come down to hear the river talking though it is only a whisper at the moment beneath the ice." The man paused to gaze up the river. "Come, you may spend the night at the village and you will want to see the grove."

"The grove?" Lester wasn't sure if he had heard aright.

The man nodded. "We have dedicated a grove to your god, Konnor. This seemed like a good place since nearly everyone has to cross here so it was likely you would pass this way."

"What's he saying about Connor?" Becker demanded.

Lester didn't often feel embarrassed, but this was clearly going to be one of those occasions. "It is possible that when we first met I mistranslated Connor's surname."

"So, what? Instead of Connor Temple you said...?"

"I think I may have introduced him as Connor, the god."

"Heaven help us!" Becker shook his head, but he was grinning.

"Just don't tell Connor, when we get back."

"Don't worry. He'd be insufferable but still." Becker chuckled quietly and nudged Lester with his elbow.

Baron looked back towards them with a grin. "Come! This way."

* * *

The grove was ringed by ancient oak trees. In the depths of winter they were stark and bare of leaves, but their thick trunks had a permanence and solidity that exuded a sense of calm. The snow was churned up at the entrance to the grove where people clearly came and went regularly, but it lay calm and undisturbed around the bases of the trees. Inside the grove were wooden statues set in a loose ring. They were carved in a variety of human and animal forms. Some were so old and weather-worn that they were virtually featureless, details worn smooth by gales and rot. The most recent statue, of course, had to be Konnor but without the context of their previous conversation Lester would never have guessed so. Word-of-mouth had clearly failed to describe Connor adequately. The figure of a man before them was huge and well-muscled. In one hand he held a strangely shaped sword with spikes sticking out of it. Lester's best guess was that someone had tried and failed to explain an EMD to these people. In his other hand was a round spiky ball, that was probably meant to be an anomaly. The figure of a lizard cowered defeated under his feet.

"Is that Connor?" Becker asked in disbelief.

"He's very large," squeaked Emily. "Some of his... parts... are very large indeed."

Which was certainly one way of putting it.

"He is a warrior god of fertility, yes?" said Baron. "We hear he has many women. Is it a good likeness?"

"Uncanny," Lester managed.

* * *

Emily allowed herself to relax as she sat at Baron's table. Two huge stone fireplaces were built at either end of the long wooden feasting hall and, packed as it was with most of the village, the warmth was tangible and welcome after their long journey through the cold winter. They were served the almost ubiquitous pottage of millet, peas and salt meat, but it made a pleasant change from the salty gruel they were able to cook up with the pulmentum avenaticum and salt pork fat that they were using a travel rations.

Lester and Becker sat opposite her on the other side of the table, but it was not too wide to prevent conversation. Lester was distracted by speaking to Baron, who was acting as their host. Emily spent her time talking quietly to Becker although she also listened keenly. She had learned a little German in her youth, not enough to have made head nor tail of the obscure ancient dialect spoken by the people in Culm, but she had paid attention over the months and learned enough simple words that she could buy goods, and exchange a greeting. Moreover Baron's German was much closer to the kind she had been taught than the rough accent of Culm. She could almost follow the conversation if she listened closely.

Baron, it seemed, was holding forth in contempt of the crusaders and their Christian ways. Emily bit her lip and held her peace. She had seen too much and travelled too far to find much comfort in the rigidity of the Teutonic Knights' version of God but she was always surprised when people expected her to have abandoned belief altogether as if the wonders she had seen would somehow remove her belief in the creator.

"I have three good wives, and they all do well by me. What cause have these knights to say I should put two of them aside and what would become of them if I did?" Baron asked.

Baron's wives clustered at the end of their table, gossiping among themselves, but they giggled when Baron waved expansively in their direction.

"Our priests are good. They are always happy to arrange a marriage, at any time. Perhaps you would care for a hand-fasting?" Baron asked glancing meaningfully between Lester and Becker.

Lester choked over his pottage.

"What's he saying?" Becker demanded immediately.

"He's offering to get someone to marry you and Lester," Emily said, before Lester could make something up.

"What would we want wives for?" Becker asked, a small frown creasing his brow.

"No, to each other," she corrected amused. She had wondered for a while about the two of them but had lacked the courage to mention it. Clearly Baron had no such inhibitions.

"He's offering us a gay wedding?" Becker asked, his eyes round with surprise.

"So it would seem."

"In 13th century Prussia!"

"We would appear to have been somewhat misinformed about medieval attitudes to homosexuality," Lester said dryly.

It was at that moment that Emily saw the full import of Baron's words finally sink into Becker's brain. "Wait! He thinks we're lovers?"

"You are good together," Emily hazarded.

Becker glared at her across the table and she shut up.

"Tell him thank you but no," Becker said firmly.

Emily caught Lester's eye. He looked a little disappointed but politely told Baron that he and Becker were not courting.

"Emily, you don't think?"

"I really don't think its any of my business." 

Emily's travels had broadened her horizons a lot. The church's teachings were manifestly wrong in many areas and it was not difficult for her to accept that God's love and human love could appear in many different forms, and that the form did not matter so long as the love was true. However her upbringing had not, sadly, equipped her to discuss such affairs of the heart. She did think either Lester or Becker should make up their mind and pay court properly to the other, but the 21st century concept of romance was entirely foreign to her. And as far as she could see it provided men like Becker and Lester with little by way of a road map for expressing their feelings.


	5. Lake Peipus

Becker's heart thudded in his chest as the frozen expanse of the Lake came in sight.

"This is not, not good," he said.

"You've mentioned that several times over the past few days," Lester said blandly, but his face was pinched with worry.

There was shouting in the line of knights in front of them. No doubt the scouts were returning with news of the location of Alexander Nevsky and his forces. The column of soldiers and miscellaneous hangers on came to halt.

"This is Lake Peipus?" Emily asked, bringing her horse to a halt next to them.

"Do you doubt it?" Becker snapped. 

They had been overtaken by the Teutonic Knights on the river Aa that emptied into the Baltic just north of Riga and could be followed inland in the general direction of Novgorod. The story of Emily, the warrior maid, had preceded them into Livonia, the northern territory of the Teutonic knights and they had been received with a weird Christian martial fervour and promptly conscripted. This time the knights weren't crusading against the pagans but against the orthodox Christians of the Novgorod republic. They were just as certain that God was on their side however.

Becker and Emily were both dressed in the white tabards and black crosses of the Teutonic knights. Becker had declared himself the warrior maid's bodyguard while Lester had been demoted to the rank of baggage handler. Officially their story was accepted. However Becker had a feeling that Prince-Bishop Hermann of Dorpat, who led these knights, doubted them. Not enough to denounce them, but enough to make it clear he expected them to fall in with his military expedition against the Orthodox stronghold of Novgorod. Even if they weren't actually a Teutonic Knight and a proto-saint on a mission from God, the Prince-Bishop was happy to make use of them as a morale boost, so long as they behaved. The only plus side was that the tabards they had been given each doubled up as a coat-of-plates, with riveted metal stitched into the fabric around their chests. It wasn't much but it was better than relying on chain alone.

"What happens now?" Emily asked.

"I've seen the movie," remarked Lester looking at the frozen water with distaste.

Becker hadn't seen the movie. However, an interest in military history gave him a good idea where and when they were. At some time, and dates had never been his strong point, a bunch of Teutonic knights had clashed with the forces of Alexander Nevsky on the frozen water of Lake Peipus. After hours of fighting the knights had been routed and fled out into the center of the lake where the ice cracked and the knights fell into the icy water beneath. They had most definitely ended up on the wrong side of this particular fight.

"I've vaguely heard of the movie," Becker said without enthusiasm.

"It's a seminal Soviet-era propaganda film but also of interest in the development of the climatic battle scene in the modern action movie." Lester's voice was dry.

"Will it help us get out of this mess?"

Lester shook his head tersely. "No."

Becker had been concerned they were heading for the Battle on the Ice from the moment Alexander Nevsky's name was first mentioned by the Prince-Bishop. His only hope had been that this was a different army altogether which he'd never heard off. There were actually only a handful of Teutonic Knights present. The majority of the army was made up of vassal knights of various Danish or German dignitaries along with a large number of Estonian auxiliaries

A herald moved down the line, shouting out instructions. Even Becker's German was now good enough to know they were to set camp for the night and commence battle in the morning.

"Can we get away during the night?" Emily asked quietly. They had taken to keeping their voices low. The Teutonic Knights disliked chatter and took pride in their ability to accomplish even complex tasks, like pitching camp, in complete silence.

Becker glanced at the surly Brother Konrad who had been tasked with minding them. Konrad clearly had little belief in their tales of a divine mission. He watched them like a hawk. When the large helmet didn't conceal his face, he did so from beneath glowering brows. He was not going to be easy to sneak past.

"During the battle then?" she suggested.

"There is likely to be a lot of confusion," Lester agreed.

Becker nodded. "We still have one functional EMD and I have my Glock. If we can escape to far the side of the lake we can blend in with the Russians."

Lester snorted. "We don't blend in with anyone."

"But if we get rid of our armour and tabards we don't look like crusaders." Emily pointed out.

Becker's heart was heavy. "I don't like it but it is the best idea I have. We must make our move as soon as possible though."

"Be silent!" admonished Brother Konrad.

Becker sighed inwardly.

* * *

The day dawned bright and clear. A gentle breeze blew across the lake, no doubt fresh from the wastes of Siberia. Becker and Emily were placed in the center of the mounted cavalry. Lester, as their baggage handler, was allowed to remain in the rearguard. The plan was that he would attempt to skirt the battle. Lake Peipus was really two large lakes with a narrow sound joining them together. The crusaders had pitched camp on the western side of the sound, while the Rus were on the eastern side. It would take far too long for Lester to walk around even the smaller of the two lakes so he would have to cross the sound and just keep as far away from the battle as he could.

Becker had been in battle before but never anything like this. He had become accustomed to travelling in armour ever since he left Culm, but he had never had to seriously fight in it. The heavy helmet restricted his vision to a tiny letterbox in front of him. With her helmet on, Emily was indistinguishable from the other knights. 

With a wheeze a pipe organ fired into life. Becker winced inside his helmet. It was going to be like fighting a battle with lift music as accompaniment.

The Prince-Bishop raised his sword in a signal and then suddenly they were charging across the lake in a wedge shaped formation. The sounds of the pounding hooves drowning out the jolly hurdy-gurdy sound behind him.

At the far side of the sound, the ice ceased to be a smooth surface and instead was broken with high ice ridges. This slowed the cavalry down and they lacked the momentum to punch through the line of pikemen beyond.

After that, the battle was more like a rugby scrum than any fight Becker had been in before. Men and horses pressed close on all sides and Becker was glad of the added height his horse gave him above the Rus'ian militia below. Although his sword had a folded steel edge, he had to cut and slash using the strength of his arm. It still parted chain and then flesh but not in the way that a sharp knife would. Becker tried to work his way to the back of the line, but found Brother Konrad blocking his way.

There was a loud shout from the left somewhere. Becker swung his head around desperately trying to see something of what was going on. A bunch of mounted archers in Rus'ian dress were riding along the left flank of the army. The left flank was made up of the Danish contingent but as Becker looked about he realised he couldn't see the Estonian infantry anywhere at all. Suddenly his side looked badly outnumbered. The Rus'ian arrows filled the sky. They were falling short of Becker's position but were clearly doing a lot of damage. Becker swung his head again but couldn't identify Emily. Brother Konrad he recognised easily by the horns on his helmet and the man was still at his side. 

Deciding regretfully that it was now or never Becker passed his sword to his left hand. He'd strapped the Glock to his leg and he pulled it out of its holster and shot the Teutonic knight at close range, aiming high to miss the coat-of-plates, not that it probably made much difference. The man dropped from his saddle. Becker's horse shied in surprise and Becker almost lost control of it juggling, as he was, sword, gun and reins. The press of men about him acted in his favour since they blocked the horse's path. Becker quickly reholstered the Glock and turned his attention back to using the sword.

Becker urged his horse through the main scrum. He couldn't see Emily anywhere at all. Groups of Rus'ians still surrounded him and he was painfully aware how dangerous it was to isolate himself. A shout went up somewhere to his left and he could hear horses hooves galloping on the ice. The press around him lessened, his attackers becoming distracted by events elsewhere. Then, as he glanced behind him to the western shore he saw Emily marching towards him, silhouetted against the cold winter sun. She had lost her helmet and her hair hung loose in a tumble of curls. She still wore the long white tabard with the black cross stark across her chest. Her sword was in its sheath at her side and she stalked forwards with the EMD in her hands.

Becker sheathed his own sword and pulled out the Glock again. Emily shot one of the outliers of the group of around Becker. The man dropped but the effect on the other Rus'ians was startling. Men screamed in fear and surprise at the arcing electricity. Emily shot at another man and then suddenly the press around him thinned out and the Rus'ians began to flee. Becker dismounted quickly, from now on they would be shooting and he didn't really want to be attempting that from the back of a horse unused to gunfire.

Becker dumped his helmet on the ice. There wasn't time to unlace his tabard, but he wouldn't be needing it again and so simply sliced through the cloth with his knife until it fell off. Emily ripped her tabard off as well. He pulled a long cloak from his saddle bag and tossed it towards her. They didn't want to lose their chain-mail yet, but she would be more conspicuous than he would and the cloak would cover her hauberk. He had no idea what had become of her horse. 

They made their way to the far shore, keeping as far from the fighting as they could. They reached edge in time to see the start of the rout. The crusaders vanished into the hazy distance. Becker strained his ears for the sound of breaking ice and the cries of drowning men, but he could hear nothing over the shouts of the victors. Then he and Emily began the long trudge along the lake shore, away from the Rus'ian camp until they found Lester and his horse.

* * *

That night Lester dreamed.

The waters of the lake were still and dark. The bodies floated downwards, dragged by the long white robes and the heavy armour. They were peaceful. None of them thrashed or struggled, they just sank past him their arms wafting in the slight currants. Dozens of Teutonic knights, each falling to his doom.

One had lost his helmet. The body was rotating in the water, his feet sinking faster than his head. Slowly his face became visible and Lester saw Becker's drowned face. His eyes were still open. His face was framed by his short dark hair. His arms reached out in supplication towards Lester and then he sank away from him, to lie dead on the cold bottom of Lake Peipus.

Lester awoke with a cry, to see the pale stars shining above him and the glowing embers of their fire.

"What is it?" Becker asked.

"Bad dream. Sorry to wake you."

"You didn't." 

Lester sat up to see Becker sitting hunched by the remains of the fire, staring out over the lake.

"Still coming down from the battle?" Lester hazarded.

"Something like that. It was bloody brutal. I've been in battles before, nothing like that though."

"It was worse?"

Becker shrugged. "In some ways, I don't know. It was very personal. I could see the faces of the men I killed."

Lester shivered. "I dreamed you drowned with the knights."

Becker looked his way and his face was inscrutable. Then suddenly Becker turned and crawled over, pulling Lester into his arms. 

"I didn't drown," was all he said.

They remained like that until morning.


	6. Novgorod

Spring was truly on its way as they walked into Novgorod. Since, Becker and Emily had had to abandon their horses at the battle, they now only had Lester's horse which had to act as pack animal for the three of them. The road was paved with split wooden logs which raised it above the mud of the spring thaw. All the birds were singing as they walked along the track and Becker felt faintly ridiculous as he looked across at Lester.

Lester simply grinned and held out his hand to give Becker's a small squeeze. Then they rounded a bend in the track and saw a cart in front of them. Lester dropped his hand. By unspoken agreement anything between them would remain firmly closeted until they were back in the 21st Century. 

Then they rounded another bend and Becker gasped in surprise. They had been told, for months, of the glory of Novgorod the Great. Becker had not paid a good deal of attention. After all these were people who hadn't yet discovered _buttonholes_. He'd assumed Novgorod would be a bigger version of Culm or Thorn. But Novgorod was big. Well, he mentally corrected himself, not _that_ big. He could see the far side of it. But it was still larger than anything he had seen in months. 

Culm's grid of streets had consisted of five running in one direction and six in the other. Becker had been able to cross the town on foot in less than ten minutes. Novgorod looked to be at least four or five times the size. The city was roughly circular in shape and was bisected by the river Volkhov. Rough wooden walls surrounded the city. Inside there was street upon street. The streets all seemed to be raised wooden walkways, much like the road they were already on. Hundreds of wooden houses rose up to a cleared area in the centre. This area was surrounded by further walls that enclosed a few low buildings and then five domes of a large church. Even from this distance Becker could see the many merchant ships thronging the river and he had no doubt that the streets of the city were crowded with people.

"Well, we made it!" remarked Lester.

* * *

The bells of St. Sophia were tolling out for Christmas morning. Becker was used now to the strange rhythmic sound of orthodox bell ringing. So different and yet so similar to that of the English village in which he had grown up.

They made their way from their lodgings towards the gold and silver domes of St. Sophia that rose up on straight towers, over the surrounding streets and houses. They had been in Novgorod nearly eight months and were almost settled. It had not been as easy as fitting into life in Culm since neither Emily's Latin nor Lester's German were of much use to them. But they were gradually picking up the local dialect and many of the traders who endlessly streamed through the city were German. The city was rich in furs and it did a roaring trade along the rivers to both Scandinavia and the small states that made up Germany.

Becker almost failed to hear, over the chiming of the bells, the insistent beeping of the anomaly detector. They had been carrying it with them everywhere since winter set in. Emily had it sandwiched between her prayer book and bible and it was only when she pulled it out and glanced down at it that Becker was aware that it was sounding out its own chime.

"Don't tell me Ethan was right!" he said in amazement.

"Wonders will never cease," said Lester.

"It is this way." Emily led them off the main thoroughfare and into a maze of side streets. 

In the end they had to climb a low fence into the back yard of some wealthy citizen before they found the shining ball of light.

Becker stared at it in indecision.

"I had better go and check," he began, but Emily had already marched through. Moments later she returned.

"It's definitely close to your time. I have not found a paper for a date, but I believe it is somewhere in England. I can hear English bell ringing and carol singers, anyway."

"Could be America," pointed out Becker.

Emily smiled. "It looks English. Have a little hope for a Christmas miracle." Then in a swirl of skirts she was gone.

Becker turned to Lester. "Well, looks like this is it."

Lester said nothing but turned and gazed east. The street they were on was on top of a rise and the countryside stretched away from them.

"You're not going to miss this place?" Becker questioned in surprise.

"I don't know. The road we came in on carries on, you know. Out there is the rest of Novgorod Province and beyond that the Mongols and the Golden Horde, all the way across Europe to China and then Japan."

"Yeah, but we're not fucking Marco Polo are we."

Lester chuckled. "No, I suppose we're not."

"Come on, at least you don't smell of rosemary like I do. The lads will never let me live it down once they catch a whiff of me."

"I am touched that you use my gift."

"Daft bugger," Becker muttered and, in spite of himself, finally gave into temptation and risked pulling Lester into a kiss. After all, they would be out of this benighted century in a minute or two.

The kiss lingered but eventually Lester pulled back and held out his hand. Becker grasped it and they both walked through the anomaly to where the bells were still ringing nearly 900 years later.


	7. Historical Notes and Recipes

Oh God! I needed to do _so_ much more research for this than I had time for. If I had my own way I'd go on a massive book buying spree and then settle down to write in a big pile of them and emerge blinking with a story sometime around July.

However, it was not to be.

Massive thanks to Steve who pointed me in the direction of the Teutonic Knights when I asked him about the history of Poland. He also kindly lent me _The Teutonic Knights_ by William Urban upon which I've relied quite heavily. In particular, when in doubt, I have adopted spellings from this book for people and places. I'm not sure it was _so_ helpful of Steve to lend me a further 5 books on the 21st December, including _Lake Peipus 1242: Battle of the Ice_ and _Teutonic Knight: 1190-1561_ by David Nicolle and _Crusader Castles of the Teutonic Knights (1): The red-brick castles of Prussia 1230-1466_ by Stephen Turnbull. However all three proved very useful in adding a bit of final polish to the story.

Thanks are also due to Steve and Jim for an enlightening discussion on medieval armour and sword-making and, in particular, what might particularly strike a soldier trained in modern weapons when using them.

Quite a lot of the details about daily life come from _The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century_ by Ian Mortimer, which is all very well as far as it goes though of course it is discussing life a century after this story is set, and focuses on life in England not in Prussia.

All the stuff about urban planning in Culm comes from _[The Plans of Medieval Polish Towns](http://www.urbanform.org/online_unlimited/um199902_63-78.pdf)_ by Marek Koter and Mariusz Kulesza. These days the town is called Chełmo and may, or may not, be in the same place it was in 1241.

The low down on medieval hair gel came from _[The Encyclopedia of Hair: A Cultural History](http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9Z6vCGbf66YC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false)_ by Victoria Sherrow.

When I discovered [Food and Drink in Medieval Poland: Rediscovering a Cuisine of the Past](http://www.reenactor.ru/ARH/PDF/Dembinska.pdf), fredbassett was driven to write me a stern email saying "More writing, less researching". "Thick Beer" was/is apparently a vicious drink made extra-inebriating by the inclusion of "marsh tea" which contains a poisonous compound called andromedotoxin. I think thick beer was mostly used as a sour-dough starter, but it was obviously drunk on occasion as well, and I'm sure some random Pole would have thought it funny to get a stranger drunk on it. Most of the dishes mentioned are from recipes in this book, including the Compositum of Cabbage, Chard, Dill and Mushrooms with Cheese dumplings which appears to be vegetarian (assuming you eat eggs and cheese) and not too obviously impossible or arduous to make. Having berated me for researching too much, Fred then advised including the recipe as an appendix. You will find it below.

As far as I can tell very little is known about the actual religious practices of the 13th century Prussians. Most of the stuff I read, which is presumably based on the writings of crusaders rather than the people themselves, mentions sacred oak groves and polygamy and I've simply extrapolated from there. There is no historical justification for kick-arse big-dicked love god Connor... or, for that matter, for some kind of Teutonic Joan of Arc precursor called Emily.

Eisenstein made a seminal film, _Alexander Nevsky_ which includes a lengthy sequence depicting the Battle of the Ice. A sequence which, the internet assures me, forms the basis for many subsequent large scale battles scenes in films such as Star Wars and Lord of the Rings. Prokofiev wrote the music for the film. You can find the battle scenes on YouTube if you are interested. I was very tempted to make Becker this chap:

  


The Battle of the Ice, as depicted in Alexander Nevsky, forms a central part of Russian/Soviet myth-history in which the Russians successfully repel a more technologically advanced and powerful invading German force.

Modern historians seem to downplay the extent to which the Teutonic Knights were actually involved in the Battle of the Ice, most attributing involvement to the Sword Brethen, who were a kind of unwilling sub-order. They are also inclined to downplay the overall political and strategic significance of the battle, though it is hard to ignore the fact that afterwards the crusade against Orthodox Russia was quietly abandoned. There is no contemporary evidence that the crusaders actually fell through the ice during the battle though there is no evidence that they _didn't_. I've hedged my bets on that subject. Urban says it's just possible that there might actually have been a pipe organ.

There is heaps and heaps of material out there about medieval Novgorod which was not only an immensely important city but had unique conditions which have preserved a vast wealth of material. They even have [children's drawings from the late twelfth/early thirteenth century. Sadly there wasn't really room in the story to include even the small amount of stuff I managed to read on the place. Most of the information I have included comes from ](http://www.goldschp.net/SIG/onfim/onfim.html)[Life in 13th Century Novgorod](http://www.oocities.org/medievalnovgorod/) by Gregory William Frux.

Lastly, thanks to majolica from little_details for her advice on middle low German greetings.

### Compositum of Cabbage, Chard, Dill and Mushroom (Komposjtum z Kapusty, &Cacutewikły, Kopru i Grzybów)

_This recipe for a middle-class burgher family in a large city like Cracow is both a fasting dish for meatless days and a side dish for fish. A semi-dry white Hungarian or Rumanian wine would have appeared on the table in wealthier households, at least on special occasions._

_Surviving foodways practices among peasants in Poland and other parts of Central Europe support the idea that **composita** were always baked or braised, usually in large, covered earthenware pots. Recipes that have survived elsewhere in Europe, especially in Switzerland and southern Germany, share one common feature: the ingredients are arranged in layers. The Romans and Byzantine Greeks also made dishes of this type, owing to the recipe's flexibility._

_Serves 4 to 6.  
_

* * *

1 medium onion cut in half lengthwise, then cut into thin slices.  
8 cups (680g) white cabbage shredded as for sauerkraut  
4 cups (200g) chard shredded as for sauerkraut  
1/4 cup (25g) finely minced lovage  
1 cup (100g) chopped dill  
4 ounces (125g) mixed wild mushrooms, coarsely chopped  
1/4 cup (60 ml) garlic-flavoured vinegar  
4 tbsp (60g) lightly salted butter  
salt and pepper to taste.

Preheat the oven to 190C. Scatter half of the onion over the bottom of a heavy, 4l baking pot, preferably earthenware. Scatter one-third of the cabbage over this, then one-third of the chard. Sprinkle half of the lovage and dill over this, then cover the mixture with the mushrooms. Scatter the remaining onions over this, another one-third of the cabbage, and all the remaining chard, lovage and dill. Cover with the rest of the cabbage and add 1 cup (250ml) of water and the vinegar. Cut the butter into thin pieces and dot the top of the cabbage with them. Cover the pot with a tight lid and bake in the oven for 45 minutes. Then stir the mixture and serve immediately.

### Cheese Dumplings (Kluski z Bryndzą)

Yield: 32 to 36 dumplings (serves 8 to 10)

1 cup (125g) bread crumbs  
1 cup (125g) barley flour  
1 tsp ground mace.  
4 tbsp (60g) lightly salted butter  
2 pounds (1kg) bryndz&acedil farmer's cheese or any feta-type cheese  
8 chicken egg yolks or 4 goose egg yolks.

Mix the bread crumbs, flour, and mace in a large work bowl. Melt the butter and combine with the crumbs, mixing thoroughly until the mixture is loose. Grate the cheese on the small holes of a vegetable grater and add this to the crumbs. Beat the yolks until frothy, then combine with the mixture. Work this with the hands into a soft paste. Mold the dumplings so that each weighs about 2 ounces (60g) and resembles a long potato or gefilte fish. Set the dumplings on a baking sheet or large plate to dry for about 20 minutes.

While the dumplings are drying, bring 1 gallon (4 litres) of salted water to a rolling boil in a large stewpan or soup kettle. Turn back the heat to medium-low so that the water is barely quivering. Add the dumplings. When they rise to the surface (in about 15 minutes), they are done. For each individual, place 2 or 3 dumplings in a bowl and serve the compositum over them. These dumplings


End file.
